1. Made $65.93 at the farmers market this weekend. I'm very happy with the way farmers market is turning out this year. I'm only selling three different baked goods every week, which take four or five hours to make (as opposed to ten last year). With the six hour market day (shortened one hour for the month of May!) and four hours of baking, I'm now making $5.00-$7.00/hr. doing the market as opposed to $1.00-$2.00. If you're interested in how I managed to do this, read my book, One Season of Farmers Market.

2. Helped Hubs make a book display stand for selling my books at the market, using free scrap lumber and an old used hinge. It works great! I put in another order of books today, as I've sold all but one of them. The net profit has almost surpassed that of Pizza Night, and I've only been selling it for a few weeks. Though it was more work to publish a physical book (as opposed to only an ebook), it was well worth it. Selling books is a passive form of income, which I love. I make the same profit selling one book as a bag of cookies, but the cookies have to be made again every week. A book only has to be made once.

6. Made ice cream! One of my goals last week was to use up some extra milk before it soured, so on Saturday I decided to make some ice cream to go with rhubarb crisp I brought home from the market. I used the Cuisinart ice cream maker we received as a wedding gift (it's one with a freezable bowl). I've only used the appliance a couple of times, so it felt good to use it again. Instead of adding two cups of cream and one cup of milk, I just used three cups of goat milk. The ice cream turned out fine anyway! It was kind of "slushy" like any homemade ice cream, but after I put it in the freezer the texture was better. I figure that making the ice cream saved at least $3.00 as opposed to buying it. Plus I have better control over the ingredients that way. The only problem is that I keep putting it back in the fridge instead of the freezer. *facepalm*

8. Planted corn & flower seeds in the garden. As in the past, my pre-sprouted corn kernels started poking up from the ground a day or two after being planted. I can't say how much I love pre-sprouted sweet corn. I also collected more grass clipping mulch and did more mulching this week.

9. Used a Ponderosa coupon (an email incentive) on our date night to get one of our buffet orders for free. This literally cut our bill in half!

10. Made a Sugar Jar. We used the last of our salt last week, so I cut out the top of the container (with the metal pourer on top) and cut it down to the size of a small mouth canning jar lid. Then I used the new "lid" on a canning jar. I got this idea from the ever-popular Tightwad Gazette, given to me by a friend.

The Sugar Jar is my newest health & wellness project. Instead of eating NO sugar during the week and stuffing my face with it on the weekend (my previous plan), I put a whole week's worth of sugar in the sugar jar. Whenever I bake something with sugar, add sugar to tea, etc., it comes out of the sugar jar. And when the sugar is gone, it's gone. When Hubs ate half a box of Little Debbies, I took the sugar content of those snacks and poured it out of the jar. By the time he finished that and a can of pop, he had eaten half a cereal bowl full of sugar. Scary!!

To determine "a week's worth" of sugar, I used the amount rationed to British citizens in WWII. You know, for some historical flavor. You could also try amounts from different historical periods as well. Our sugar "ration" is a little over two cups per week (so, about one cup per person per week). I think the sugar jar is more effective psychologically for controlling sugar intake than total deprivation, but it also sheds some light on how much sugar is in prepared foods. "20 grams" is something that most of us have no concept of, but we can better picture the amounts in ounces or cups. Physically weighing out the sugar before you eat it is like paying for something in cash. It hurts more!11. Used an Ibotta rebate paired with Manager's Special pricing to buy a loaf of bread for $0.25. In order to get the rebate, I had to peel off the sale sticker, which was hard to do without stretching the original barcode on the bread bag. But it was worth it. :)

12. Bought peanut butter on sale. We hardly ever eat peanut butter, but I do use it for farmers market baked goods. The cheapest we could find several weeks ago was a huge 4lb. jar for $1.58/lb. This week it was on sale for $1.00/lb., so I bought 12 lbs. This should be enough to last at least a year, even WITH baking for farmers market.

13. Earned $13.90 by returning aluminum cans and recyclable bottles. I also took a couple bike rides around the neighborhood and added cans to the stash before we returned them.

14. Got a Kroger "free" coupon. Every Friday, Kroger and its affiliates give out a coupon for one free designated item. This is only for those with an online account, which is easy to create. This week's freebie was a 2-liter of Kroger brand soda pop. The coupons last for two weeks.

15. Something I don't talk about often is eating out of the freezer and pantry. We do this every single week. During the springtime I work especially hard cleaning out the freezer to make way for more garden produce. This week we ate beef, lamb, green beans and sale-bought mozzarella cheese out of the freezer. Unlike cheddar and other pressed-curd cheeses, the mozzarella we froze actually sliced VERY well when thawed out. I still have some random vegetables (cauliflower, cucumbers, radishes, squash, pumpkin) as well as green beans and shelled peas to eat. I'm not sure what I'm going to do with the peas because they are kind of hard/overripe and I really hate eating peas. They might end up as chicken/goat food. :/ Goals for Next Week:1. Move indoor plants outside.2. Continue mulching garden.3. Send in kids' registration paperwork.4. Make more soaps.5. Continue to clean and organize pantry/freezers.